Your weekly money in politics newsletter. Donate Today [[link removed]]
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February 29, 2024
Montana’s competitive – and expensive – 2024 Senate race
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Incumbent Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.) has taken a huge fundraising lead over his opponents in what is shaping up to be one of America's most competitive, and potentially most expensive, Senate races.
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Republican candidates outpace Democrats in self-funding campaigns
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Self-funded Republican congressional candidates outpaced and outnumbered their Democratic counterparts in 2023, an OpenSecrets analysis found.
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Chart of the Week
Dive deeper into the data behind the headlines
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“In general, women earn less than men, so gender earnings have consequences in politics,” Kira Sanbonmatsu, senior scholar at Center for American Women and Politics (CAWP), told OpenSecrets. “We have been interested in learning about that statistic because of what we know about gender differences in the economy.”
The Center for American Women and Politics has partnered with OpenSecrets on a series of reports examining the gender gap in the finances of politics at the state and federal level. They have found that at the state level, female candidates are less likely to self-fund compared to male candidates and attribute this disparity to differences in personal wealth.
Male self-funded candidates also outnumber female self-funded candidates by more than 5 to 1. Female candidates self-funded just over $7 million in 2023, whereas male candidates made up the remaining near $87 million.
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OpenSecrets in the News
See our media citations from outlets around the nation this week:
Trump and his favorite fundraising platform both face donor problems (CNBC) [[link removed]]
In 2019, Trump’s campaign committee collected $72 million in donations of $200 or less, according to OpenSecrets. From November 2022 through the end of last year, Trump’s presidential campaign collected just $27 million in donations from those who gave $200 or less. That’s a difference of $45 million and represents a 62.5% drop in small-dollar donations from the year before the 2020 election to the year before the 2024 election.
Group tied to anti-abortion Trump mega-donors pours money into Alabama supreme court race (The Guardian) [[link removed] group funding the Alabama,to take place next week]
The group funding the Alabama candidate, Fair Courts America, is connected to anti-abortion billionaire mega-donors Richard and Elizabeth Uihlein. The Uihleins are the second largest individual political donors in the country, according to the OpenSecrets. In 2022, they donated more than $89 million exclusively to Republicans.
[[link removed]] [[link removed]] [[link removed]] [[link removed]] [[link removed]] [[link removed]] Defense Contractors Are Bilking the American People [[link removed]] (The Atlantic) [[link removed]] [[link removed]] [[link removed]] [[link removed]] [[link removed]]
According to the watchdog group OpenSecrets, defense contractors spent nearly $140 million lobbying the federal government last year. Millions of dollars more go directly to members of Congress in campaign contributions from companies, individuals, and political-action committees linked to the defense industry.
The GOP's 'Spectacular' Recruits To Run For The House Are Flailing Financially (Huff Post) [[link removed] Republicans' campaign arm crowed,well behind in campaign cash]
Tammy Murphy does a 180 on dark money now that she’s running for Senate (Politico) [[link removed]]
New York jury finds ex-gun lobby chief liable for graft (Daily Mail) [[link removed]]
[[link removed]] Crypto exchange Coinbase suffers outages amid bitcoin rally (The Hill) [[link removed]]
Elon Musk is going to war with Google (Business Insider) [[link removed]]
Who's actually paying for the ads against the Florida social media bill? (Tallahassee Democrat) [[link removed]]
YouTube Mysteriously Restores Crypto Billionaires’ Attack Ad Against Katie Porter (Gizmodo) [[link removed]]
Are Gavin Newsom backers raising money for a possible Democratic presidential bid? (The Sacramento Bee) [[link removed]]
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